It was during one such lunchtime that I wandered back to the farmhouse at the top of the hill and over the other side to an area, that in my mind seemed like a good idea and, I hadn't hunted there before. This area turned out to be far too steep and experience has taught me that when the ground gets steep the detector goes quiet. I headed along the contour of the hill until I found a more inviting area to begin my hunt.
It was a very quiet lunch until it was nearly time to go and I got a rather soft 40's to 50's signal. I figured I'd dig this bullet so I could at least go home with something. The ground was extremely hard which always gives me hope that whatever I am about to unearth has been there for a quite some time. After digging a bit of the soil out I re-checked the signal as I have found that signals can change after removing the topsoil, and it had. The numbers climbed and the signal sounded better and better each time I rechecked while digging down, until it was in the high 70's. I was running out of lunch-hour and the hard ground was causing my shovel to slip towards the center of the hole with every kick. Then suddenly I saw it, and heard it too unfortunately. my shovel grazed it on the way past. "That's a big coin" I muttered to myself as I bent down to pick it up. I assumed it was a Penny by the size but at this point it looked like a round disc of green, crusty nothingness. The signal was soft but easily heard. The Simplex had done well to pick this coin up on edge and about 25cm deep.
On the way home I wondered whether this Penny was a George or an Elizabeth. I started brushing the coin and was surprised when the date started appearing at the bottom, the pennies I'm used to finding have the date at the top. 1921, my oldest coin to date. There was a feint image of a person seated coming through.
 |
| My latest Penny after a little brushing. |
Could this be one of the bucket list coins I have been looking for? Yes! This is one coin I have had my eye on for a while now. A picture of a seated Britannia holding a trident and shield on the reverse with King George the 5th on the obverse, a British Penny.
 |
| Un-dug Example from 1936 (that's what I'm after) |
I decided to attempt to clean it as I didn't have much to lose seeing that it was so badly crusted. I'm learning slowly that sometimes patience pays off and I'm going to need to be more patient cleaning these going forward. There is a technique of soaking coins in Olive oil and removing them occasionally to brush them, that can have excellent results, if you are willing to wait up to 6 months. I'm still too impatient and hurried this one along a little.
I hunted that area round the hill, weaving my way down over the next few days. I did get this broken key that turned out to be quite interesting. It has the words Willy Overland stamped on it and seeing as I had no idea what that was I jumped on to the internet to find out. Turns out it's a motor vehicle manufacturer and they manufactured vehicles for the Military in WW2. Their MB model was the original go anywhere vehicle that later became known by it's nickname, "Jeep". Their name changed to "Willys Motor Company" in 1963 so this key must have predated that. It also has a serial number engraved on it "WI 370". They did also manufacture other vehicles but I found the Jeep reference quite interesting.
 |
| Willys Overlander Key Piece |
I had been waiting all week to get back to the promised land of buttons and bullets to try find some more pieces to this puzzle. The Boer War forum let me down. I only got 2 answers to my post on the American buttons. The first suggested that local tribes may have stolen the uniforms from soldiers and all my buttons could even be from the same tunic. The other referenced a very interesting book written by an American Irishman who came in search of gold and ended up supporting the Boer cause, suggesting a link to American soldiers that fought here.
The thing that bothers me most about the buttons is that their manufacture date starts from 1902 and the timing doesn't seem to fit. The British General Service button follows the same pattern. I put it forward to the British Military badge forum and senior member responded saying, "It has a kings crown so from 1902 - 1957, probably too late to get to South Africa for the Boer War." It looks like this mystery is just getting more mysterious as the days go by and I am going round in circles looking for my next big break in the story.
Back to fields and my daughter was first on the board with a very old spoon handle. No identifying marks but if you squint your eyes just right and imagine really hard you might see the initials JG on it. Wait, the light just shifted, nah, I don't see it anymore.
 |
| Old broken spoon handle |
Well we hunted and hunted. My wife got some bits of broken harmonica reed and I got a 1c coin and a button that turned out to be a rivet when I cleaned it.
I was super disappointed, our new land of possibility turned into a land of not that much. I started wondering if perhaps the farmer back then wore military uniforms purchased from an army surplus store because they are high quality and designed to last in tough environments. Just one of my many theories.
On Sunday we decided to hike to the southern end of our permission, through the Macedonia plantation, towards the 3rd dam we hadn't been to yet. It was a blistering 31 degrees Celsius and we made the mistake of climbing a steep hill to patch of cleared sugarcane first. We quickly headed down to the plantation to escape the heat in the shade of some big trees that form its border. Here we found signals a plenty and I discovered my "coin sense". "This ones a coin" and out came a 1c, "Here's another" and out came a 2c and so it went on until I had two of each. My wife had stumbled onto a shooting range, or so it seemed as she was digging bullet casing after bullet casing for a modern 9mm pistol. We rested for a while and then decided to head along the the trees towards the dam. I got a screaming 80's signal that was only 4 inches or so deep and shouted "Here's a spendy" as I thought I was about to dig a R2 or R5 coin when much to my surprise out popped a very crusty 1952 Penny. What a beautiful surprise it was and tears of sweat ran down my brow.
 |
| 1952 South African George the 6th Penny |
I soon realized that there shouldn't be sugarcane where we were and for the first time since speaking to the farm owner, we had wandered off our permission. We called it a day started the grueling walk home.
Monday came and we had another go at getting to the dam, a little wiser after reviewing our designated area on Google Earth. First stop, the plantation, to see what else we could find. We found mostly modern bullet casings but I did dig this old button from Firmin House. They are the oldest manufacturing company in Europe and have supplied buttons to every monarch since Charles II (r. 1649 – 1685). Boasting an impressive three and a half centuries of experience.
The dam provided shade and a beautiful location for lunch. I also got to find 2 more coins from the 70's while fine tuning my coin sense.
 |
| View of the dam from the wall. |
On the way back I dug a rivet that turned out to be a button, hows that for a turn around? Later that afternoon during the sunset session in Junkville I added another button to the list.
 |
| The other more modern button. |
All in all not a bad week and although there were many ups and downs it has left me feeling particularly optimistic about our future hunts here. I heard the crackling of burning sugarcane again this morning and I couldn't help but wonder if a new field of possibility has just opened up.
 |
| The sunset as seen from Junkville. |
No comments:
Post a Comment